*BSD News Article 50183


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From: wpaul@ctr.columbia.edu (Bill Paul)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Subject: Re: npasswd
Date: 4 Sep 1995 16:50:55 GMT
Organization: Columbia University Center for Telecommunications Research
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Daring to challenge the will of the almighty Leviam00se, Leo Bicknell
(bicknell@ussenterprise.ufp.org) had the courage to say:

: 	I just tried to compile 'npasswd' on some new
: FreeBSD machines we got.  These machines are running
: yp so they have the same account database as our OSF/1
: and Ultrix machines.

Okay, I took a closer look at it.

The answer is: forget it, it won't work. Not the current version
anyway. I don't even know how you got it to compile, since the
pw_yp.c module uses the fgetpwent() and putpwent() functions
which FreeBSD doesn't even have. Also, while it claims to have
support for the 4.3 hash password database, it most certainly
is not compatible with 4.4.

When I got to the official FTP site at utexas, there was a note
from the author saying he'd disabled access to the current version
(1.2.4) because he was trying to get 2.0 ready for release and he
was getting tired of answering questions about 1.2.4, which is
several years old.

: 	While npasswd compiles fine, it core dumps when
: trying to change a password.  In addition, if you run it
: as root it prints out "must change password for xxx on
: server".

Again, I can't see how you got it to compile. Either you're
using a different version than the one I have (1.2.4) or you
did some hacking that you didn't think was important enough
to share with us. The currently available release of npasswd
just plain will not work with FreeBSD (or NetBSD, which has
the same sort of password database), or any other 4.4BSD
variant. Maybe 2.0 will.

Now, if all you want is the part of npasswd that checks for
stupid password choices, you might be able to make that part
work with FreeBSD's existing passwd program. Other than that,
I'd say wait for npasswd 2.0 to come out and try again.

-Bill

--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~T~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-Bill Paul            (212) 854-6020 | System Manager
Work:         wpaul@ctr.columbia.edu | Center for Telecommunications Research
Home:  wpaul@skynet.ctr.columbia.edu | Columbia University, New York City
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